Demon Curse – Looking Back on 2021

Jack doesn’t believe in curses. He doesn’t believe in luck or omens or superstitions (although, if a black cat ran across his path, it would be bad luck for that cat.) He may have a point, but given the hard, cold facts about the Melbourne Football Club, you could be forgiven for having a sneaky suspicion that they have been dealt an unlucky hand for 57 years.

In 2021 Melbourne Football Club killed it. If you thought coronavirus was the height of destructiveness, you weren’t paying attention to the lethal trio of Christian Petracca, Max Gawn and Clayton Oliver and their merry band of mischief-makers.

Before the glorious Melbourne Premiership, the commitment involved in barracking for the Demons was like living your life in perpetual cycles of riding the Ghost Train at Luna Park. Preseason aspirations equated to the thrilling anticipation of the ride. Flights of fancy placed you in the realms of the supernatural, where the appearance of Lucifer himself, could send you into a paroxysms of hysteria and like Faust, a Melbourne supporter would sell their wretched soul to gain a piece of silverware.  As the ride starts you grip the seat and feel a sense of excitement and also foreboding.  The doors open and your senses soar. You are plunged into darkness so early in the ride. But wait. Did you see a flash or light at the end of the tunnel? Yes there is a light. Oh no, you change direction. Hey! Did someone touch you up?  Horror overcomes you as you experience the familiar sensation of cobwebs and skeletons rattling chains, haunting empty black spaces. You burst through into the real world, the door shuts and your ride is over. Anticlimactic, as you always knew it would be.

Like the menace dwelling within the Ghost Train ride, the Demons were allegedly bedevilled by an unsettling thing – a curse. It involved the most successful Melbourne coach ever.

As though admonishing a lairising protégé, the bronze figure on a plinth outside the Melbourne Cricket Ground looks in a hurry to exact revenge. The statue is of the great Melbourne coach Norm Smith. Immaculately attired in a suit and tie, his crooked index finger belies a straight talking, triumphant, bluey with a touch of football genius.

I guess it’s unfair to lay the dearth of Melbourne Premierships for the last 57 years at his kick-arse Oxfords. He coached the Demons to six Premierships, the last in 1964 and played in four Premiership sides, kicking seven goals in one.  Unbelievably he was sensationally dumped by the Melbourne board during the season of 1965 via a courier to his home, which was probably the equivalent of the notorious ‘Dear John’ text message. His apparent acid tongue was kryptonite for Smith among the board, after the disclosure that Ron Barassi, the celebrated Melbourne Premiership captain who was boarding with Smith, was about to skedaddle to Princes Park, home of the Carlton Football Club for some extra moolah with Smith’s blessing.  Smith was reinstated after some boardroom intrigue involving a County Court judge, but stated, “It will be many, many years before Melbourne will play in the finals again let alone become a force. And it will be a long, long time before Melbourne wins another Premiership.” And that’s where it started – the Melbourne curse.

In contrast to Smith’s prediction, a mere twelve years after their last finals appearance, Melbourne was on a course to seemingly waltz into the finals and have a crack at the ‘Holy Grail.’ In the last game of the season and needing to account for the bottom dwellers Collingwood, which they did, the Dees were reasonably expecting, and depending on Footscray to succumb to the top team Carlton. But the curse reared its ugly head when Footscray scrounged a surprising draw, squeezing Melbourne out of the finals and cockily taking their place. Was Norm Smith standing in the celestial grandstand uttering, “I told ya”?

In 1987, flirting with danger, the Dees hatched a plot to propel the darling of the Members’ wing, the pirouetting and loyal, retiring captain Robbie Flower into the finals.  With another nail-biting sub-plot involving Melbourne beating Footscray at the Western Oval and the unlikely outcome of Hawthorn beating Geelong at the Cattery in the last game of the season, the Dees were launched into the first final since 1964. Under the stewardship of former Tiger John ‘Swooper’ Northey, the eager band of blue and red brothers swept all before them. North Melbourne’s season was pronounced dead early in the elimination final as Melbourne cruised to a 158 point win, the largest margin in an elimination final. They scorched the Sydney Swans by 149 points in the semi-final.  And all of a sudden there was a buzz in the city of Melbourne, The press fell over themselves to know where these interloping ragamuffins had come from.  They surprisingly found themselves in the preliminary final with a shot at making the ‘Granny.’ And then the Melbourne curse struck.

Facing Hawthorn in the preliminary final the fledgling Melbourne boys must have felt the trickle of hot wax as they soared too close to the sun on the unseasonably warm September day. Melbourne held a 22 point lead at the start of the last quarter. By the final siren Melbourne led by 4 points after a parade of players shanked, slew and slaughtered shots at goal in a belated fit of stage fright.  But that wasn’t the end. A Hawthorn player by the name of Gary Buckenara had been awarded a free kick on the fifty metre mark just before the siren. Could he kick it? Questionable. It was then that the hapless Jim Stynes, schooled in the foreign Gaelic football code ran across the mark of the said Buck. The penalty awarded to the Hawthorn player was 15 metres, but it could have been the first circle of hell for all the Demon supporters cared. Could he kick a goal from thirty five metres out? Yes. And he did. And the Demon fans cried for another year.

1988 came and Melbourne proved that they weren’t a flash in the pan side. They made the coveted ‘Granny’ to face dastardly Hawks. The cursed twist came when Steven ‘Strawbs’ O’Dwyer, part of the successful ruck duo was suspended for whacking a Carlton player, (well who wouldn’t?)

Twenty four years on from the last Premiership, the Dees fans whooped and hollered as their side ran out onto the Melbourne Football Ground in front of a crowd of 93,754. Their appearance in the final proved a crash scene as their chance of adding to the trophy cabinet took a dismal turn. The Dees were pummelled by 96 points.

Jimmy Stynes, not only redeemed himself from the horror of ‘87, but was catapulted into legend status when he won the 1991 Brownlow and every prize from the Players Most Valuable Player Award to the Bentleigh RSL chook raffle. It was the highlight of that period when the Dees teasingly hovered in the finals until tumbling to11th in1992 and into football wilderness.

Under the guidance of ‘The Reverend,’ the beloved Neale Daniher, the Demons dared to transcend the firmament and ascend into football heaven once again.  When the Dees burst through the banner and onto the MCG for the Grand Final of 2000, the Melbourne supporters hoped, prayed and crossed everything from fingers, to legs, to eyes. But the 96,249 crowd were aware that the rampaging foe, the Essendon Bombers, was probably one of the most lethal football combinations for an age. They had won a record breaking 21 consecutive games with an average winning margin of 51 points, also a record.  

A chance sighting of Shane Woewodin, Melbourne’s star midfielder at a Melbourne pool gave our family reason to believe it was a good omen. It was, for Shane that is; he went on to win the Brownlow Medal that Monday night. And that was pretty much where the excitement ended.  After the medal presentation, Neale Daniher celebrated and ribbed his erstwhile coach and the present coach of the Dons, Kevin Sheedy The mirthless Sheedy short of a retort, bided his time until following Saturday when he had the last laugh as Essendon delivered a punishing 65 point win that was no joke for Melbourne supporters. Even an all in brawl after Melbourne player Troy Simmonds was felled by Michael Long couldn’t reignite a Rocky-like fightback. Curse them.  

Melbourne supporters suffered vertigo from the rapid acceleration and deceleration up and down the premiership ladder in the following few years. And then we plunged into ennui as Melbourne descended into a period of football doldrums. We searched for other winter pastimes like finger knitting, yodelling and practising simpering smiles in response to being a source of amusement when mocked about our nonexistent Range Rovers escaping to patchy ski fields and five star chalets mid-season…or before.

There was a glimmer of hope in 2017 after Melbourne had slowly climbed from paltriness to mediocrity under Simon Goodwin. Again we had thrillingly scraped into the eight on the Saturday of last round of the season. As we reached for the Xanax and prayed to our deity of choice, our tenuous position relied on the result of a game in the far flung reaches of the continent the next day. The odds were in our favour as the team who could usurp our position had to play the League leaders. All looked set for a Melbourne finals appearance. But, with 10 minutes to go, as if dancing to diabolic discord the West Coast Eagles seized the win from the Adelaide Crows in a cursed pile on of the Dees. They edged us out by a pathetic half of a percentage point. I mean, it wasn’t even a whole number.

2018 saw the Dees have some success. We had made the eight after another twelve years and feeling a wee bit smug as we met the West Coast Eagles. We had beaten them five weeks previous – no mean feat given the Eagles almost criminal home ground advantage. On a sunny Saturday arvo, we displayed a reckless bonhomie as we took block on the couch in front of a substantial cheese platter to watch the preliminary final. We took selfies, striking poses with mouthfuls of brie and No Name water crackers. I missed part of the first quarter due to a nervous trip to the rest room. I should have stayed there. The game was a debacle, a disaster, a destruction, a demolition and I can’t think of any more ‘d’ words. Clayton Oliver finally opened our account after the long break – a very long break if you count the first half.

The less said about the 2019 season, the better. So I won’t.

2020 was stupid. COVID-19 threw a veritable Sidchrome into the works, and the curse was alive and well. Games were suspended, teams were put into hubs or pubs, I never really found that out. The length of games was shortened so that Mickey Mouse could have roved all day without needing the interchange bench to rest his skinny legs. Melbourne was hounded out of Victoria and Sydney became its home. (Sydney? Did you ever?) The dreaded disease then sent the Dees out of Sydney and to Maroochydore (Get me Google maps!) They ended up in tropical Cairns – duped into thinking they were on vacation, where wearing zinc cream and quaffing Great Northern at 5pm is de rigeur – and forgot how to play football, losing to nobodies thus dashing finals hopes again. It would take a shameless team to claim a Premiership in this year of chaotic, COVID-19 crackpottery, and Richmond was that team.

Demon fans suffered from PTFD – post traumatic fade-out disorder in this period. It’s difficult to recall the facts, (my therapist told me not to.) Melbourne had the yips. As the old saying goes, they snatched defeat from the jaws of victory in what became a compulsive disorder.

2021 heralded a new era for the Dees. Suddenly Melbourne left the fade-outs to White King and rejoiced in a new game plan called – winning. Unfamiliar with the new formula, Dees fans became wary of their new surroundings. Like bewildered funsters, discombobulated in one of those rickety, centrifuge rides, we were climbing the walls unable to process these new emotions. Did we trust Simon Goodwin to part the football seas to find the promised Premiership land, or were we to wander aimlessly in the football desert for generations?

There was a strange feeling of slight detachment, disbelief and Dali-esque time warp when the Demons rans onto the oval in the distant land of Western Australia for the Grand Final of 2021 against the Western Bulldogs, fifty seven years, six days and five hours after their last entrance to a successful Grand Final. The laws for the containment of coronavirus, dictated that no Victorian Melbourne fans could legally set foot outside of Victoria, let alone place a pinky toe over the Western Australian border. 

We sat in front of the telly sans cheese platter; associated with losses we had chucked the Cheddar, ditched the Danish Blue and scrapped the Stilton. Club coloured scarves and beanies were banned. Any skerrick of conceit, over-celebration or pre-emptive yahoos were not tolerated. Having become football nihilists we had been conditioned to keep our emotions in check, to the point of severe melancholia. And with suitably dire expectations and a stark awareness of the curse, we watched the game.

First blood went to us by virtue of a sublime snap by Petracca on the 50 metre mark. Excellent. But that was just a beginning; there were three thousand nine hundred and five excruciating seconds to withstand. At quarter time we were ahead by 21 points; a frighteningly small margin.

The second quarter gave rise to the familiar dread and resignation. Cracking through like a coronavirus cough, the curse intervened to deny Max Gawn an actual goal by way of a goggle-eyed call. Even the Bulldog barracking commentator, Tony Leonard attested to it being a six-pointer. Frittering away our lead, the Bulldogs struck fear and loathing into us as they piled on goals with their captain Bontempelli snatching a mark on a slight angle and slotting it with 31 seconds to spare taking them to an 8 point lead at half time.

It was horrible. I left the confines of my living room to wander the dark and deserted roads to question and resent the meaning of football life. These desolate, lockdown streets reflected the sense of impending doom. Contemplating breaching curfew, I surmised that if I got caught, a night in the cells would be a better option than watching another cursed Demon demise. However I returned home, womaned up and planted myself on the sofa like a boss. At about the eleven minute mark when bloody Bontempelli sent another one through the sticks, my PTFD peaked, I am ashamed to say I fled to find refuge in my bedroom, but not before having a passionate row with my beloved daughter about who would suffer the most if Melbourne lost.

Having lost control of my senses I found an old Sudoku and set about finding a set of numbers that I liked, whilst peeking at the occasional live score and protecting my ears against muffled roars from the outside world.

When I re-emerged from my cave of despair, Melbourne had played the most scintillating, inspired minute of sport since Russell Crowe, despite being mortally wounded, dispatched Commodus in front of a full house at the Coliseum. The Dees had kicked the last seven goals and led by 24 points, including a raid of three goals in under a minute, right before the bell. Yes. due to my severe PTFD I missed it. I nervously teetered on the edge of the sofa, ready to take flight should the Bulldogs condemn Melbourne to football ignominy and the rest of us to the madhouse. Just before Bayley Fritsch took Melbourne to a 6 goal lead early in the last quarter, Triple M commentator Lachy Reid was asked to “call it.” Being a Melbourne supporter for “far too long,” he declined as he lamented, “Anything happens in their games.” I understood completely.

However, delirious with goal fever, Melbourne launched an explosive burst of scoring shots in the last quarter. They emptied their showbag of football treats including a goal from half back Christian Salem, a six goal haul from Bayley Fritsch, Christian Petracca razing the turf with a Grand Final record of forty possessions and Tom McDonald helping the Dees to the highest winning margin by a Melbourne Premiership side with a goal after the siren.

With four minutes on the clock, the cameras were trained on the aptly named Simon Goodwin as he embraced a jubilant assistant. I thought it was premature. There were minutes to go; anything could happen. And it did.

The Demons prevailed by 74 points. The Melbourne theme song played. I checked my pulse. I was still alive. The Melbourne Football Club had won their first Premieirship for 57 years. It was my first ever. Jack and I embraced. He was crying.  

It is said by some, namely my nephew Andrew, that when blood was spilt on the Perth football ground by the hirsute, haemoglobin depleted Max Gawn that the curse was broken.  After a reckless sling of the gangling Gawn into the boundary turf by Caleb Daniel in the third quarter, the Demon captain rose from the tackle phoenix-like and with renewed intensity and a claret smudge above his right eye that gave him an aura of, shall we say, the demonic. That incident was a precursor to a storm of goals.

In the end my nephew was right. The curse was broken and Norm Smith’s prophecy was vindicated, culminating in Christian Petracca receiving his eponymous award . Fifty seven years is a long, long time.

Jack was right also. While not admitting to curses Jack was pragmatic, concluding, “every Gawn-dog has his day.”

To those gone too soon, we remember you:

Robbie Flower

Troy Broadbridge

Dean Bailey

Sean Wight

Jimmy Stynes

Colin Sylvia

And those whose spirit ignited the fire, we salute you:

Neal Daniher

Nathan Jones

The Turnbull

He thought that he was the Mighty Boss – but ‘Kings’ Will Dream. As he strutted through his grandiose castle he was perturbed to find that walls had started to crumble. Through the grimy cracks he gazed imperiously upon his minions and noticed the bothersome John Snow approaching.

“Your Malcolmship, there is trouble afoot. The oracle has consulted the Divine Unicorn and warns of a Youngstar who seeks to displace you.”

“Quieten down John Snow. I am invincible. Be gone you lowly harbinger of misfortune.”

John Snow displayed his usual obeisance and exited through the back door.

As the lonely figure of Turnbull stood completely motionless – his usual stance – he pondered, “Would they really Ventura Storm? I shall initiate a pre-emptive strike and finally show some Grunt, The Tally is in my favour.

Alas it was a Trap For Fools for a Winx as good as a nod to a blind man.

Just Chuck It

There comes a time for chucking stuff. But when is that time? If you ask Trevor Chappell he would probably say, “it’s tricky.”

I want to chuck a lot of stuff. The house is full of, how shall I put it? Crap. My dear daughter came home from living away, or rather her stuff did. Then she merrily absconded to Europe and left me with narrow passages, buttressed with towering boxes, ready to cascade like giant, wobbly Jenga blocks.

I feel like Moses must have felt when he hot-footed it through the ominously piling Red Sea, shouting “Run! It’s gonna blow!”

Jack won’t even go into her room for fear of getting stuck again. He fearlessly launched himself into her once bedroom, eagerly seeking her presence. Unfortunately he lodged himself in a tight, dark place between bags bulging with Imelda Marcos’s lost collection of shoes. He had the added indignity of having to gingerly extricate  himself out, bum first.

Choosing what goes and what stays can be an onerous task. For example we see the case involving the Australian Department of Agriculture recently. They decided to chuck it. It, being a package of priceless botanical specimens (although their value was marked at just $2 for customs duty purposes). Actually they not only chucked it, they burnt the bejeezus out of it. A typically Australian thing to do with Australian flora.

That is, the Australian Department of Agriculture. Not the Incendiary Department nor the Guy Fawkes Commemoration Department, but the Department for nurturing and growing stuff.

The parcel contained 105 irreplaceable plant samples that seemingly originated in this country. Big oops.

The specimens had been assiduously collected by a French monsieur shortly after the settlement of our colony by white jokers.

The intrepid Monsieur Labillardière squirelled (or wombatted) his precious cargo away in the hope of it being preserved for posterity when he returned to France.

Alas, the voyage home didn’t go to plan. A bit of argie bargie between the French and the Dutch landed the French citizens with not much liberté in Indonesia, where they were thrown into the clink and their goodies seized. Then a ticklish skirmish ensued between the English and the Dutch (argumentative lot.) This meant that the prized specimens found their way to the Old Dart.

Labillardière was distraught. He implored his old mate Bansky (not the graffiti guy, nor the Commonwealth Banksy) But Joseph Banks, plant man extraordinaire, to go into bat for him and have his box of goodies retrieved and sent to France. Joe came through and the package duly arrived in France,  safe and sound. It also survived two world wars.

But, before you could say “herbarium”, an Australian administrative snafu ended all that nonsense.

Very decisive.

That’s what you need to be when chucking stuff; decisive and dogmatic. My problem is that I tend to be sappy and sentimental.

Sitting with Jack in the square metre of space while sorting clothing, crockery and furniture can be challenging.

He gets disgusted at my inability to detach myself from material things. He thinks I anthropomorphise them.

He tells me that I won’t miss stuff when it’s gone. He says the only thing that he would miss (is not me) but his Pedigree Pal and his coat.

So I’ll keep my coat…

…Oh and I will keep Ripster the Street Shark toy, because as a kid, my son Matthew used to play with it and it was the toughest Street Shark. And I will keep the glamazon Bratz doll whose feet menacingly come off when you change her shoes. Rose used to play with that. Oh, and the Hot Wheels racing cars that Matthew always challenged me to predict the fastest one. Invariably my choice was wrong. It would be revealed by the result of a highly orchestrated and contentious Hot Wheels race through the house that it was in fact, a lemon.

On  consideration, maybe I should get rid of those Hot Wheels. They always get in the way of my socks anyway.

But objects are often entwined with memories and memories pull at your heartstrings. It always makes me sad to chuck stuff out. Not because I want to keep stuff, but because of the hopes, dreams, good and bad times associated with them.

I have a tenner with the picture of Henry Lawson on it, that my dear mother gave me close to her death. It went out of circulation when I did – a long time ago. If I had used it at the time I would have been able to buy five white instant coffees and two neenish tarts. Now, if I used it as legal tender, other than a shop attendant being aghast at a cash transaction, they would probably take back my soy decaf mochaccino and goji berry oatmeal activated almond cookie and call for security.

In a practical sense that tenner should have been used by now; its monetary value being greatly diminished. But it’s intrinsic value is in its association to its former owner. So I am keeping that too.

Its value is probably a fifth of its original value. Hey that’s $2. Department of Agriculture where are you?

Maybe I need to be more Zen and less Barnaby Joyce about stuff. His over-zealous attachment to the Deputy Prime Ministership, before being prised from it, in his floppy Akubra and half mast moleskins, was truly awful to watch.

With that image in my head I have convinced myself. I surrender. I am going to abscond to Europe. Jack, take over and just chuck the lot.

 

 

Summer Love

She was annoying at first. Flighty, flirtatious, forward, always wanting to provoke me. I knew that she was attracted to me – handsome beast that I am. But hey, I am the one who always takes the lead. That’s my role. That’s what I’m bred to do. Not her.

The old girl occasionally coaxes me into the car for a trip to visit her brother and sister-in-law at the seaside idyll of Somers. Tedious journey that it is, with the old girl cranking up Midnight Oil and singing along, the destination proves salubrious. Bracing sea air and a dip in the briny provide a good reward.

Unfortunately ‘she’ is there – Evie. She arrived at this residence a couple of years ago, much to my disgust. Before her there was the matron – Jasmine. Stately and aloof. She reigned when I was a rambunctious pup. It made no difference when she snapped at me, I just kept coming back for more. Now l  know that she was just trying to teach me some manners, albeit from the comfort of her daybed.

But Evie was something else. Pretty? Yes. Lively? Yes. Pain the derriere? Dogdamn right!

Last week I accompanied the old girl on the appallingly long trip to Lakes Entrance. Again I had to endure the torture of listening to the old girl sing. The sultry strains of Amy Winehouse were slaughtered by a rasping wail, the owner of which struggled to negotiate the delicate semitones and nuances of jazz.  But it only served to enhance my anticipation for the rewards which would include unlimited access to my neighbours’ children’s food, and of course numerous walks and swims.

But I was aghast.  When we arrived l  saw that ‘she’ was joining us.

The intimacy of shared discoveries on the early morning walks with my old girl would be marred by ‘her’ exuberant hustling. When we ventured out for our carefree beach strolls, I would be besieged.

Luckily she was tied up a lot during the day and I could escape, but when the opportunity arose she was persistent. Kissy kissy here, bodily contact there. It didn’t stop.

I was disgusted. I demand respect. I’m a proper boy, an elder, an exemplary beast. It was exhausting. It was exhilarating.

And then we left.

Back to Pakenham with its enclosed yards and structured routines. No access to untended food. And no Evie.

The yard looked lonely. I could dogdamned well sit where I wanted without being jumped. But in the end -I miss her.

 

Nice Trip? No, Just A Fall From Grace

Falling over is not funny. Actually it is hilarious. One minute you are operating in the troposphere at about head height and upright. The next minute you’ve disappeared from everyone’s eye-view, your bum greets on-lookers and you have shot-put your head into the turf.

Alternatively, you have been gracious enough to keep your face upright as your derriere plumbs subterranean depths like a rubberised double meteorite shattering civilizations of ants.

The really funny thing is that the fallen one doesn’t concern themselves about compound fractures, fatal bleeding or shredded threads – the foremost concern of the fallen one is – “who saw it?”  The fallen one has unwittingly sacrificed themselves as a source of entertainment and mirth.

So I fell.  Not quite sure how it happened; trying to find my keys in the bottomless pit that is my handbag while negotiating uneven ground and juggling oranges and eggs maybe. It was Friday, I could have been frantically and blindly racing in the opposite direction of work.  My feet could have been celebrating that by doing their own thing. I was pretty certain that I wasn’t controlling them.

A fall happens in slow motion. You are catapulted into the air thinking “this is new.” Your surroundings blur like nebula. For moments you float like Dave in 2001: A Space Odyssey, pondering the calamity that is about to unfold. And then gravity finally and uncompromisingly smashes you into terra firma – and when the ground is firmer; the more terror.

I was lucky. I fell in front of a parked four wheel drive. Normally, vexed by these expansive vehicles that make parking near them impossible, I actually rejoiced in its bulk as it hid my undignified departure from the vertical.

Well almost. One lady called from behind the car “Are you alright?” The answer is always “yes,” said with an insouciant joie de vivre. “Ha ha ha, I do this every day.” “No broken bones?” she inquired while suppressing a snicker, I assume, as I wasn’t actually facing her with my face, if you know what I mean. I sprung up like a jack-in-the-box. If my leg had broken into three separate parts, I still would have boinged up like Skippy.

There could also have been some youths loitering in front of the supermarket and indulging in what youths do; wait for someone to fall over and chortle.

Any way who cares? I’m in good company. Helen Mirren has come to grief a couple of times, once in Cannes and another time at the Berlin International Film Festival. She plopped down like a collapsing soufflé amidst her ruffles and flounces. (Although I can’t be sure that her graceful slips compare to my ungainly spill.)

Former Presidents and Prime Ministers have ’come a cropper’ on more than one occasion. Former US President Gerald Ford decided he would try some human aerobatics as he took a nose dive on the last few steps of Air Force One, landing on the Austrian tarmac minutes after the plane did.

Former Prime Minister John Howard took on the footpath to sharpen himself up before an interview in the west a few years ago. And who could forget Julia Gillard submerge her noble nose into the Subcontinent due to some dodgy kicks. “I’m alright, I’m alright,” she chirped as she popped up like a spring lamb.

The thing is that you always remember a fall, either yours or someone else’s. It effects you physically and mentally. You realise that you can be reduced to a damned fool in the blink of an eye. Self control deserts you and what little authority you had has gone down the gurgler.

I remember assaulting the asphalt as a grade oner, having a little crybaby cry and then congratulated myself on producing the copious amounts of blood.

I remember the time when I took Jack for a twilight stroll. After a few close calls as he hurtled towards me from thirty metres, aiming to corral me like I was a headstrong Hereford heifer, he finally slammed into my side. My knees buckled and before you could say “bon appetite,” I got a gobful of grass.

Misstep memories happen to anyone at any time. My daughter and I were exiting a cafeteria one fine day via a set of steps. An elderly woman and her daughter were coming up the said steps. Unfortunately the older lady unaccountably careered off the side and into the bushes. The woman’s daughter and I raced to help the misdirected lady, who thankfully was quite jovial (embarrassed, mortified) and unhurt (probably sustained a broken hip.) My dear daughter’s response, was a very human response. She laughed.

We probably started falling over about six million years ago, making the other hominims guffaw into their hirsute hands. A thigh bone found in Kenya indicates that it was about then that our forebears began to stand upright as well as have the ability to climb. (presumably they plummeted out of  trees too.)  Standing  enabled them to pick fruit from higher branches (although if you can climb?) It also meant that they could free their arms to carry things such as tools and mobile stones. By standing up, the hominims looked more imposing. (Except when they were falling down.) About two million years ago they had just about nailed it as their anatomy gave them the ability to run long distances in the open spaces, tripping as they raced.

Jack never trips over and you rarely see other animals that stand, like apes or bears go ‘a over head.’ It seems that humans provide that rare form of theatre.

The other day I saw an article about a Kenyan professional marathoner who was running in the woods in Maine.  He encountered two black bears. He dashed away from those bears like a comet. He didn’t fall, but imagine if he had. Those two black bears would have had a field day. Gees they would have laughed.

 

 

 

 

Queen’s Honours and Pig’s Ears

It’s the Queen’s Birthday long weekend: Winner winner chicken dinner I say. To celebrate an extra day off work, for this weekend only, I adopt a temporary pro-monarchist stance. It’s also the opening of the ski season. Brrr. And it is the weekend that the celebrated Queen’s Birthday honours list is released.

These quaint awards were instituted by Her Maj in 1975 in recognition of high achievement and service. They superseded the British honours system. In 1976 knights and dames came galloping into the mix. In 1986 the knights and dames went galloping out again as Australia embraced modernity. Then in 2014 Tony Abbott, in a fit of medieval nostalgia re-ig-knighted the knights and redeemed the dames, famously awarding Prince Phillip – yes that’s Prince Phillip, Queen Lizzie’s other half, a knighthood. Say what? This quixotic spectacle rattled even The Australian so much that when Prime Minister Mal arrived on the scene, he swiftly sent the knights and dames cantering into the sunset, again.

As I peruse the list of the lucky ducks who have made a hit with Queeny, I say to Jack, “it makes me ponder the use of such awards.” Jack doesn’t reply. He is course very egalitarian in his views, so I know that his response will be along the lines of – for dogs; goodness has its own reward in the shape of a pig’s ear. It keeps all dogs on a level.

But you can’t hand out pig’s ears to people of high honour can you?  Some say yes, if it’s art. But you can’t make this ilk purse art of a sow’s ear.

People who do good things need to be appreciated and rewarded, even if it’s in the name of some ageing monarch who lives seventeen thousand kilometres away in renovator’s delight with seven hundred and seventy five rooms. (Airbnb where are you?)

I am all in favour of recognising doctors and scientists like Ross Garnaut who snared a sneaky gong. Such people have used their brains and skills to alert society to the perils of climate change or advance medicine or have researched for years to find cures for humanities ills. They have sought to improve our world in general. Big tick to you. You certainly deserve more than a pig’s ear. We should have images of you flashing on billboards or at the very least feature on sequined tee-shirts.

To the anonymous souls who take on foster kids, those who dedicate their time to feeding the poor, helping refugees, those attending to the elderly, sick and mentally ill – you are the glittering gems in the crown of goodness. Go to the top of the list.

Actors and entertainers. Yeah well. Nice movie an’ songs and all that. I’m glad that you’ve done well for yourselves earning gazillions and getting your faces recognised in one hundred and ninety five countries.

Promoters, sports folk, business people – um.   And politicians. I’m thinking barrel – deep.

There are many in our communities who struggle, sacrifice and contribute to the smooth running of our society. You see every day – fellow travellers breathing in and shuffling up for extra passengers, frustrated drivers being remarkably courteous by allowing bozos into your lane, shop assistants giving an extra smile and a friendly word, doctors, nurses, teachers and parents all bearing up, fronting up, manning up, womaning up, coughing up, firing up, keeping up, making up, propping up and stepping up. These people need recognition too; the good, long-suffering citizens of our communities, in other words, us.

So Jack and I propose an award for the ordinary folk; the eponymous King Jack of Pak honours list. It will be given to those who face the daily grind while smiling through gritted teeth. And please note there will be no upgrade to knight or dame unless you are six hundred sixty years old.

Search the list to establish whether you qualify for an award, and if you do, cut out the certificate, shove your name on it and you can chuck a sickie to go with it:

List of qualifications for the inaugural Companion of the Order of King Jack of Pak (or Jack’s mate award):

For any member of the public who serve the public with a wink and smile (and a secret gin) when said public are chucking a ‘tanti.’

For any member of the public who has stood on a platform at 6.45am in four degrees, and not taken out a pistol when the 6.50am to Flinders Street has been cancelled.

For any member of the public who doesn’t broadcast their mobile phone conversations while on public transport.

For any member of the public who has travelled along the Monash Freeway in the last six months and not ended up in a mental asylum.

For any member of the public who has had to keep a young child quiet anywhere on earth.

For any member of the public who has supported a friend who has over imbibed and feels the need to expel the contents of their stomach into the gutter.

For any member of the public who has had to listen to a Hawthorn supporter complain about how badly they are going.

For any member of the public who has been a friend, or been kind, who has been supportive, or has donated, who has volunteered or has cared for someone who was sick, sad or lonely.

For any member of the public who has been kind to your pet.*

For any member of the public who has cried while watching Red Dog.*

For any member of the public who thinks Red Dog should have been given an Oscar.*

For any member of the public who thinks Red Dog is the best movie of all time.*

 

*Jack forwarded these suggestions.

 

Cut out  medal and proudly pin to your breast.

 

 

Do Bucks make luck?

Flowing through reedy saltmarsh, where ungainly waterbirds stalk unsuspecting fish and the occasional haughty black swan is not too dignified to snag a tasty treat, is the eastern-most tip of the Cunningham Arm at Lakes Entrance. It narrows, hurrying beneath the Eastern Beach bridge and spreads grandly into a golf course waterway.

It’s a practice of mine to loiter on the bridge and be mesmerized by the hypnotic tidal flow.  The water carries frenzied sprat, feeding above submerged reeds that yield deferentially to the current.

Jack places himself conspicuously on the bank, moving back and forth to catch the eye. Of course I have a stick. He knows the drill; he will fetch the stick midstream and swim to the other side and meet me there after I traverse the bridge.

But today I hesitate. Jack pads the muddy flats impatiently. My gaze is distracted by something floating close to the surface. It slowly flaps like birdwings in honey. Trapped beneath the surface, needing to be set free – it is a rectangle of plastic or paper folded evenly and curling through the surges of water.  It’s five bucks. You beauty. I will set it free.

It drifts near the rocks on the southern side of the stream, but not close enough for me reach in and swipe it out of the drink without tumbling headlong into the swirling current. I search for a suitable branch to reign in my manna from heaven, my providential gift and place it into the warm, protective confines of my pocket. And this of all days – my birthday – finally something in my life is going right.

However, there are concerns, least of all the approach of some kids from the nearby camping ground heading my way. I hog the bridge so as to interfere with their view of the cash, because if they see it, they will be ‘in like Flynn.’

Luckily they are skylarking and so absorbed in their own mastery of stupidness that they continue over the bridge and towards the beach with nary a glance at an old girl and a dog.

But in their wake toddles another interruption in the form of a senior lady.  We bid one another a wary good day and she continues across the bridge. But as she nears the end of the bridge she pauses and peers into the water.

Has she eyed the precious flotsam the stream is transporting? Move on old woman, the mauve moola is mine I feel like saying.  I stake my claim by throwing the stick into the water near the note and Jack duly cooperates by flinging himself in, swimming toward the stick, and note, and out the opposite side.

His characteristic, enthusiastic lunacy at retrieving a stick can be a little daunting to a stranger and, suitably daunted, the lady moves off to more docile surroundings.

The littoral coast is clear. So I continue on the search for the perfect retrieving apparatus. There is nothing to fit the bill. If only Jack were a retriever and had been well trained in the recovery of five dollar notes. I feel his lack of training sorely right now.

I try to get Jack to swim near the prize in an attempt to induce it into his wake. But no dice. I know that if my daughter were here, she would chance her sea-water allergy and jump right in. The kids from the camping ground would have certainly plunged right in. But me? Useless. I try to make a plan.

So I stand there ‘wishin’ an’ a hopin’,’ which isn’t a strategy at all. It’s a mamby pamby, sit-on-the-fence cop-out… and a damned annoying tune.

The fiver flutters languidly, as though it is gesturing “save me, save me dear old birthday sheila, I am yours.” I watch longingly from the bridge. It curls, almost lifeless and forlorn.

From the banks it drifts toward the middle of the stream. Right below me. One last animated billow and then it surges. Abruptly, it becomes hostage to the outgoing tide.  Away it floats. It is at the point of no return. It is bound for the lake, for the entrance, for the sea, for the realms of Ahab’s world.

Well it was just a fiver. It would only buy me a weak latte and a sixteenth of a scone.

But I ponder. It wasn’t worth a lot. But to me, a free fiver finding its way into my pocket symbolises a stroke of good luck. Now it has gone – that’s unlucky. The saying goes that you make your own luck. I could have waded into the depths of the stream, or I could have negotiated the slippery rocks to make my own luck. If I had catapulted off the rocks, cracking my head open while the sprat lapped up the blood, or if I had suddenly found myself literally out of my depth, after wading in, and the current had swept me into the ocean to be hauled up by a salmon trawler, then would that have counted bad luck, or being a silly old bugger?

However, if I had dived like Jungle Jim into the depths and triumphantly grasped the lucre with my scrawny fist while shouting “Eureka!” then could I have bragged that I had made my own luck? Remembering the cash made an appearance out of nowhere to start with.

As I watch the currency being carried by the current past a curious swan, Jack sidles up to me, poking me with the wet stick. Let’s move on he says sagely.

Back at the house I receive well wishes and cards for my birthday. My sister spoils me outrageously and takes me out for a lovely lunch. My daughter spends the wee hours baking my birthday cake. I look at Jack and he looks at me and I have to acknowledge –  I don’t need a fiver to make me lucky.

Bang Bang – Hold Tight It’s the New Year

Jack hates New Year celebrations. That is – fireworks. From the moment the first sky rocket sizzles into the night and explodes like a drumbeat of doom pounding his doggy ears, to the last shrill pop of some joker’s illicit cracker, he cringes, cries and cowers.

I on the other hand am a child and love sparkles. This year I was able to catch glimpses of the fireworks at Lakes Entrance from the front window of the house where we stay. The more magnificent the rain of colour, the more thunderous the sound and the more anxious Jack became. I tried to explain how pretty it was and massage his tense back, but there was nothing doing, he wasn’t buying it. He was not convinced things would get better.

But enough is enough. Once the last whiff of burnt sulphur disperses, it’s time to put 2016 to bed forever, and forget that it had ever existed.

It was a crock.

My daughter was sick with endometriosis and unable to work for six months. My son had a car accident and wrote off his car. He had bikes and surfboards stolen from his flat. My dear Auntie died. My sister-in-law was diagnosed with breast cancer. I suffered from an inflamed bowel and just before Christmas, the Government said that I owed their agency around five hundred dollars from six years ago. Woo-bloody-hoo.

The weather didn’t help. Australia was wetter than average and warmer than average – it was like living in a loony giant’s experimental hot house. Dorothea Mackeller would have been proud as the triumvirate “flood and fire and famine,” that appear in her poem My Country, danced about the land creating havoc. Heatwaves, bushfires, atypical northern flooding, supercell storms, national record breaking autumn heat, record breaking South Australian rainfall and, climate newcomer to the said state, tornadoes, spun emphatically out of control.

From within my rain battered, wind lashed, heat scorched little house, Jack and I occasionally flicked the curtains back and peeked nervously at the outside world to see if it still existed.

And it did. It was not the world I, as a flower child of the sixties and seventies envisaged.  Those denim, donning days were embroidered with the silken threads of the pursuit of enlightenment. The quest for peace and love, the mystical and spiritual, and the rejection of the material became the mantra. The world of 2016 wasn’t like that.

2016 was a sad, shrunken year. A year riddled with protectionist, frightened, greedy, hate speech sprouted by a profusion of bloated bombastic, privileged blobs who ping ponged off each other, at angles no one seemed to see coming.

Jack and I hurriedly closed the curtains, hunkered down and dreamt of brotherly and doggerly love. I lit a stick of patchouli incense which infused the dark air and kindled a golden nostalgia. I bedecked Jack and myself with multi-coloured love beads, (which he attempted to eat.) A futile search took place to locate a scratched vinyl of Leonard Cohen’s First We Take Manhattan  until I remembered that I had thrown out the record player and that Leonard Cohen was gone. Then we ate fondue. Ha – I’d never eat fondue, but Jack loved it.

So bugger off 2016. I’m glad you are over. The fireworks have stopped – or have they? Like Jack, I’m not convinced of that – or that things will get better. I can hear the reverberation of some cracker. So as they say in All About New Year’s Eve,* it may be a matter of – “fasten your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy year.”

Happy New Year.

 

*Apologies to Bette Davis in All About Eve

 

The Melbourne Marathon: Funless and Harshful

The first person to run a marathon was a Greek lad by the name of Philippides in 490BC. The battle-worn boy ran the forty or so kilometres through the Greek countryside to deliver a message to the good people of Athens about a home side victory against the pernicious Persians. He then promptly carked it. As far as I’m concerned this is the correct response to running a marathon.

But, as is often the case, I’m wrong. I watched a number of the good citizens of Melbourne (among them my son Matt and his friend Ben) run the forty two km Melbourne Marathon. They leapt, lunged, limped and lumbered to the finishing line. I didn’t witness anyone imitate the time-honoured heroics of Philippides when they crossed the line by clutching their breast and crashing to the ground in a paroxysm of exhaustion. So I can only assume that Philippides or ‘Unlucky Phil’ to his friends, was underdone.

It is a gruelling event and to be perfectly truthful, I can’t believe people do it. Bloody good show. Some of the effects of the race on your body are; suffering a loss of up to two centimetres from your height (temporary), due to deficiency of fluid between intervertebral discs of the spine, loss of toe nails from the pounding of small blood vessels in the foot and lack of oxygen rich blood cells, sniffles from increased air flow, cramps, blisters, abrasions and chaffing. Oh and in Philippides case there’s the death thing.

The good news is that your hearing will improve with increased circulation to the ear. And you will be about two to five kilograms lighter. (Although given most marathoners are miniscule this may be moved to the bad news category.)

But on the plus side (not plus size) it is a definite advantage to be a skinny type (so back into the good news list.) The amazing Kenyans of the Rift Valley dominate long distance running. A new study has revealed that of the young, active Kenyans who are marked as potential long distance runners, the skinny ones are the ones who have the highest ability to maximise the amount of oxygen during intense exercise or VO 2 max.  (And I was convinced VO 2 max was a new line from Valvoline.)

Even if you are not a stick figure there are marathon training programs that will guide you through the whole horrendous process and enable you to compete. They provide information like working up to the distance, keeping up the work rate and watching what you eat and drink (I do watch what I eat – it’s great to see the whole jelly cupcake go under my nose.)

However some runners dismiss these conventional wisdoms and do just fine. A method, let’s call it the Ben McKenna Method would have you visiting the Oktoberfest in Munich shortly before boarding an international flight to Melbourne and having a ‘light’ run in preparation for the ‘big one.’ It worked for him last year. He got to the finish line and came back for more this year. But kids, I wouldn’t try it at home.

Matt’s first marathon preparation two years ago similarly flouted long distance running protocols, given that he undertook the journey with a dodgy hip. Exhibiting his proud working class credentials by sporting his threadbare Yakka work shorts was handicap enough. But the major hindrance was definitely the dicky, clicky hip.  I know a crook hip can be tiresome when you are lounging on the sofa like a life size Paddington Bear, but pounding on it for forty two thousand metres sounds like the most awful excruciazating. (I know that’s not a word, but it works for me.)

It says a lot about human endurance and it told me a lot about Matt’s. There is a difference between endurance and living. Some of us may live a little, and at some time in our lives most of us will be made to endure. We will battle to keep going. The pounding on the hard road of life will dominate our wellbeing. And it will be enough that we survive. We don’t have to revel in it or like it. But the ability of humans to tolerate and possibly conquer suffering is a testament to the human spirit.

It is uniquely human to choose to test your endurance or take on a challenge for no other reason than, “Because it’s there” as the great climber George Mallory claimed. I don’t see Jack practising to be a faster or stronger dog out in the backyard, just to be his better dog self. (Although he is perfect as he is.)

Of his endeavours on the running track Matt said that you “Just get out there and hurt.” Ernest Hemingway may have sat at the typewriter and bled, but all those runners who ran the marathon, or the half marathon, or the ten kilometres or the five point seven kilometres risked real blood.

Congrats to the winners Thomas Do Canto and Virginia Moloney but more importantly congrats to all whose those who slogged it out for the sake of it. Mallory asked the question “Have we vanquished an enemy?” and answered “None but ourselves.” So to all you runners, you rose to the occasion, conquered your doubts and bettered yourselves. And now you can all do it all again next year. That’s something that poor old Philippides didn’t get to do.

Jess, Matt, Ben and Chris. Champs

Melbourne Marathon spectator.